Aftermath
by unfold
Summary: Post 6.08 Literati. 'She fell in love. And it was simple. It was easy. No, it wasn't easy.'
1. I

**A/N: Not a fan of the title, really, but I was sitting for like ten minutes, staring at my computer and trying to think of something and this was the best of what I came up with. I don't know why I insist on one word titles. I just like them. So, this will have more parts, I think. It's sort of a conglomeration of a bunch of stories I had been trying to work out until I realized that they would work nicely together. I can't lie, I love angsty Rory/Jess. So. Review and make me smile. **

She is falling asleep to the warmth of this bed and the warmth of his voice, traveling miles and miles to her ear. To the sound of her mother in the kitchen, tiptoeing around for a midnight snack, thinking she is already asleep. She is falling asleep to the way things have reversed and she is suddenly seventeen again. Not twenty-one. But, it's not the same. He's not the same. He's whispering over the phone and she isn't sure why. He's telling her about writing his book. The months that blurred together, filled with snapping pencils and cold, dank city days. He's telling her about the loneliness of New York. That's why he had to leave. And she turns this thought over in her head, He was lonely.

He says her name and her eyes snap open once more. He says, "Rory, are you asleep?" She doesn't say a word. She wants to hear him confess something to what he thinks is her sleeping ear. "Rory?" And he decides she is asleep and he sighs into the phone, "I miss you. All of you. Not just…Goodnight, Rory."

She smiles, feeling the plastic of the phone against her cheek. "Goodnight, Dodger." And she carefully hangs up the phone.

This is not the first phone call.

She called him after her reunion with her mother. She slipped into her old bedroom with the cordless phone, like she had so many times before when she called him. She sat on the bed with her legs folded under her and dialed the number he had given her.

"Hello?" His voice sounded tired and she realized it was late. Two o'clock.

"Sorry, I didn't realize what time it was. Were you asleep?"

"Only a little." He was smiling. "How are you?"

"Good…"

"You're calling from your mom's house."

"Yes, I am."

"And the world spins once again."

"Jess…Thank you."

Then there had been a pause before he responded, "Yeah, well…Just returning the favor."

She fell in love with him. Who he had become. This is what she had seen then, years ago when he was a different person. She saw this beneath his exterior. She had tried to tell them, everyone. She tried to tell him. No one would listen to her, though. But, here he was. She felt validated, justified, happy.

She fell in love with his strength, his life. He had lived, truly lived. She fell in love with all that he had been through. He had been across the country. He had traveled the way she wanted to: Without a destination, without arrival dates, without any formulated plan. He had been on his own for years. He had searched and found: himself, her, family. He had been wounded and he had recovered. He had lost and he had gained. He was everything, she thought, but not in the clichéd sense of the word. He was everything that life was. He had seen both ends of the spectrum and everything that was in between.

She fell in love. And it was simple. It was easy. No, it wasn't easy. The falling was easy, sure. It happened in the span of five, maybe ten minutes. From when he first approached her that night to when he left that night. Somewhere in that time, she was trying to decide if she had been in love with him before, maybe just on the edge of things. Yes, she decided. At seventeen she had been on that frightening precipice of love with him and he jumped while she stepped back. Because it was different from the first time, when she had willingly thrown herself from that cliff. The first time she wasn't aware of what it meant. The first time was safe and perhaps not as genuine. It was innocent and formative. And the second time she found herself on that edge, there was something more. It was fear, lust, the confusion of what was real and what was simply in his eyes. She wanted to listen to his hands. They told her to jump, that he would catch her, that the feel of his palm was enough. But, something kept her from doing it. Now, though. Now she was letting herself fall. Maybe it was in his shoulders. The way they stood now, the weight having been lifted from them. Maybe it was in his smile, genuine and full for one of the first times. The smile of a completed life, of fulfillment. Maybe it was in his entirety. The way he stood in front of her, the way he spoke, the way it was just like it had been before yet completely different. She missed him. She let herself admit that she had missed him since he left years ago.

That was the easy part. Letting him affect her like he had when she was younger. Letting him bring her back to a time when she was so completely happy that life seemed to stretch on in front of her for endless miles. Not like it was now, with a stifled sense of the future, her own stunted growth, her self inflicted sadness. She let him bring her back for a second, who she was, who she was going to be. She let his presence overtake her, succumbing to it. She let him tell her the truth.

Now, all she is left with are these phone calls. Because he isn't willing to give up his newfound life for her. Stubborn, just like she had been when he had asked her to do the same for him. And like him, she doesn't understand this. She remembers how she had begged him. How he had laughed and made a remark about switching bodies.

That particular phone call had been made just two weeks after the first. She was sitting in her parked car somewhere in New Haven, coming from a date with Logan. She leaned her head against the steering wheel and called him.

Her breathing was heavy and the first thing she told him was, "I love you." She dove head first. Easier, she told herself. She added, "I've been….These last few weeks I've…." Start and stop and start over again, "Come home."

She heard him breathe through his nose. "I can't."

"Yes, you can. Jess…" The car was suddenly freezing, her fingers turning numb as she brought her knuckles to her mouth. This was not how she had been imagining this. In her mind, there was a pause and then a soft, "Okay." from him. And then smiles heard over telephone lines.

He had a life now. A life he had made for himself. He needed to stay where he was. "It took me a long time to get where I am. I can't just drop it all right now."

"Yeah. I understand." She was somewhere else now, in her head. She was nineteen again. Standing in the darkness of a doorway, watching a shadow spill out his insides on a hardwood floor. Watching the stiffness of his face as it remained unchanged even as she felt the word shattering like a window. She was there, watching that shadow walk away, suddenly feeling everything he had been feeling. Feeling like both of her lungs had suddenly collapsed. She tried to hold her breath so he wouldn't hear the short, gasping sound of it.

Before she hung up the phone, she asked him, "Jess, God. How did you get through this?"

His voice was strained, "I don't know that I did, Rory."

And that was the hard part.

He calls her, though. At least three times a week. Always late at night. He calls her and talks to her, something he hadn't done then. He calls her and tells her anything she wants to hear. And this is how she sustains herself. This is how she makes it through. How she manages to ignore distance and history and the burning behind her eyes.

Sometimes there is silence on each end of the phone and she tries to focus her ears on the faint sound of life. His breathing, the soft sound of parting lips, the beginning of a word that is soon forgotten and put away again. It is then that she needs to feel him, that she says, "This is hard." And he always replies with more silence. "Jess, I don't know if I can do this….Talk to you and not be able to…."

His reply comes bitterly, "Are you still with him?"

"Yes." A syllable drenched in something that is part guilt and part panic.

"That's what I thought." And then a sigh, "Do you want me to stop calling you?"

"No." Another syllable soaked in her patented solution. An afterthought, "Maybe…"

She hears his breath catch in his throat. "Well, which is it?"

"Do you think you should stop calling?" The phone is shaking against her ear.

"I don't….I don't want to."

"Okay."

And this is the hardest part. (The wanting, the longing, the hope that is taunting her each time the phone rings, the love she hears in his voice when he is falling asleep against the receiver.)


	2. II

**A/N: I have this obsession with warmth, it seems. I mean, I mention warmth often in this chapter. I also turn up the angst. Maybe too much. But, I like it. I like this story. I have ideas for this story. So. Anyway. Here is the second installment. I hope you enjoy it. Reviews make great stocking stuffers. Or email box stuffers.

* * *

**

He hasn't felt empty in two years. An accomplishment that plasters a smug grin on his face in the mornings. Not since that night has he felt empty. As he walked away from her then, he made a promise to himself. Hadn't he always believed that he was in charge of his happiness? Yes, until he met her. Until his happiness fell into the hands of something else, love. He promised he wouldn't love her anymore. That's what he told himself as he was walking to his car. This was the last night that he would spend in love with her. After this, he was done.

And it had worked. It was painful at first, like pulling a bullet out with his bare hands. Soon her memory was not followed by stomach acid and stifled breathing. Bitterness faded and when he thought of her, he smiled at the happiness she had brought to him. Not the year he had spent killing himself. Not the impending doom he had felt every time her lips grazed his three years ago. He felt light when he thought of her. And he thought that was how love should have felt then, like he was weightless.

So why now was he bringing himself back into this mess?

Because her voice stirs something within him, something in the center of him.

Because he has never met anyone with as much beauty as she holds in her eyes.

Because sometimes, in the later hours when day and night are indistinguishable from one another, she makes him feel weightless.

Because her voice, perhaps distorted from the miles of traveling on phone lines, sounds so achingly desperate.

Because.

The phone calls become painful for him. And sometimes he can't find the strength or energy to dial her number. Not until he sees her projected on the bare walls of his apartment, sitting by the phone and waiting for him, her lip being pulled between her teeth, her hands pushing through her hair, her eyes moistening as she reaches for his book. Then, he calls her. And her image disappears from the wall and he can close his eyes without fear. (Clairvoyance and guilt compliment each other so well.)

She asks him suddenly, the request coming abruptly from her mouth, shattering the protective glass of their silence. "If you don't love me, just tell me."

He stops. His entire being stops. Freezes, ceases to function. He is sure that he died for just a split second, after those words left her mouth. His mouth turns unbearably dry and any words he might say are coming out as nothingness, silence.

"Just tell me so I can…"

He finds his voice. "What? So you can marry him? So you can move on?" This is the opposite of what he had formulated in his head, that sentence read something more along the lines of, "I don't love you. Not anymore." But, these words were swallowed back down inside of him.

"No. Tell me so I can…I'm not going to marry him."

"Tell you so you can what? What's going to change if I tell you I don't love you?"

"Nothing! I just….I needed proof that-"

He cuts her off and with a tired whisper and a hand dragged across his face, "I don't love you."

"Li-" And with a click, she is gone before she can finish that thought.

He laughs. At how ridiculous this whole thing is. He doesn't stop laughing until he feels wetness on his face. He wipes it away quickly with the heel of his hand.

He doesn't look in the mirror. And he doesn't think of anything as he closes his eyes that night. He crawls into bed, pulling the covers tightly around him to lock in the warmth. He turns out the light and allows himself to fall into the darkness of it. For the first time in two years, he is empty.

And he hates her for it.

* * *

She's read the book, his book. She is closing in on her 43rd time now as she turns to the final page. No longer needing to read it for plot or character development, she is reading it now to be reminded of his face, his mind, his essence. She runs her fingers lightly over the printed words; he is seeping out of every vowel and consonant. With each syllable, she feels herself being brought closer to him. And she closes her eyes for just a brief second.

And her dreams are crisp, clear, and cutting. Filled with flashes of images. Filled with snippets of feelings and memories strewn randomly across her mind. They are bits and pieces. The colors of love: White, purity. Green, envy. Red, the blood spilling from her veins, the flush of her cheeks as his fingers brush against her skin. Blue, a bottomless ocean which she is stuck in the middle of, arms tiring, legs aching.

The smell of his skin is warm and clean. And the whiteness of everything (that purity) is blinding when he enters the room. When she wakes, she will only remember the warmth that emanated from him. She will only remember the feeling of longing, yearning to be near him, to bask in that warmth. The undying need to have him near her, to press her forehead into his neck, to breathe him. She will wake and be left with a lingering contentment that will suffocate her as reality comes into focus.

The darkness of night becomes a welcome friend. Her subconscious becomes the home she returns to every night. The soft haze of her dreamscape tingeing her waking world.

* * *

She eats breakfast with her mother who watches her from across the table. She watches her because she hasn't moved her hand from the book. She leaves her thumb resting against the corner of its cover and the pages held within. In thirty minutes, her hand has stayed there on that book, her palm flat against the cover, her fingers curling against the smoothness of it.

Lorelai stops picking at her pancakes and lets her fork drop onto her plate. It clatters loudly against the porcelain, forcing Rory's eyes upward.

"Who have you been talking to on the phone so late?" The question is direct with a hint of anger, because she doesn't know. About Jess, about the book, about the phone calls, about any of it. She hasn't been told. This has been kept from her.

"Uh, Jess. I've been talking to Jess."

"Jess? That's who you've been talking to? I thought I heard you say…" A hand flies to her mouth. "Oh, my God.." She lands her eyes on the book still resting beneath Rory's hand, still being fingered idly with affection. "You're in love with him."

And this is a truth that burns you if you deny it, so she finds herself nodding and telling her, "Yes."

Lorelai nods her heard towards the book. "What's with that?"

Her fingers turn stiff against it, protective almost. "He wrote it."

"Jess wrote a book?"

"Yes." She takes it in both of her hands, flipping it open. A page she has already committed to memory. The words come easily to her mind without even looking at them. She turns to the dedication page and holds it out to her mother.

Lorelai reads it out loud, "You know who you are." She frowns. "I assume he means you."

She nods and quickly places the book in her bag, painting a smile on her face before she turns back to her mother. It is her secret to keep, how painful it was to just put the book away. As if it were him in some form, as if he is gone from her in more ways than one. Her mother doesn't need to know about the dreams or the content of the phone calls. The way his voice penetrates her skin, pours into her bloodstream, siphons air from her lungs. She wonders what his voice could possibly need with all of that air.

Now, though, her face is bright and cheerful. And her mother is none the wiser as the subject changes to something else.

Something else. The idea seems so foreign to her anymore. Before, there might have been something else. But, now. Now, there seems to be only one thing. No, two. There is him. And there is the entity that separates from him and travels the 214 miles to be her shadow. Besides these things, there is nothing else. Her surroundings are simply a blur of movement, the end of a song playing in a room somewhere down the hall.

* * *

The tea kettle's scream is loud as it announces itself to him. He is out on the fire escape, watching the ash of a cigarette drift slowly down to the street. It is the sort of winter day that never takes off, that stays in an early morning lull for all of its twenty-four hours. The sun doesn't move. And the cold air leaves him feeling heavy and stiff.

He watches the steam curl in the air as he pours the boiling water into a mug. He gently pulls at the string, lifting the teabag up and down, watching the flavor diffuse into the water. He anticipates its comforting warmth as he brings the mug to his lips.

Walking to the couch, he sees the phone sitting on an end table. It is Thursday and the usual day for calling her. He thinks about the last call he made to her. The lie he had spit out because he thought it would help. Her or him, he isn't so sure anymore. Neither, it seems. He is slowly reverting back to his old self, the self he had abandoned two years ago. The self who imagined her face constantly. Strange, that after he tells her he doesn't love her, he thinks that the only truth is the exact opposite of that.

He tells himself it is impossible, loving her now. Too much time has passed. He has done too much waiting. Because that's really what he had been doing these past two years, both getting her out of his system and waiting, hoping she would come around and find him. She didn't find him, not until now.

Of course, one could argue that everything he has been doing has ultimately been for her. He tries to push this thought into a darker corner of his mind. But, the book, the job, the relocation, the sudden visit to see her. It seems so painfully obvious to him. That she is everything. Has always been everything. His life hadn't even begun until he saw her face.

He has been reborn twice because of her. Once, in the doorway of her bedroom. When he saw her and knew that they would destroy each other. And again, in the doorway of her dorm room. When he turned himself inside out for her and she had turned away in horror.

Still, this cannot happen. Despite their changing demeanors, their love is something potent and destructive. Something neither of them is able to handle properly. And should they merge, they will surely be left mangled.

This is his reasoning.

He takes a large gulp of the hot tea, letting it burn him as it goes down. His hand falls onto the phone, the cool plastic beckoning him. He picks it up and listens to the dial tone. Before he realizes it, his fingers are dialing those ten digits and the ringing in his ears gives way to her voice. He lets her greeting peel back his skin.

This cannot happen.


	3. III

**"The one you love and the one who loves you are never, ever the same person." (from Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk)**

* * *

December 16th : Alcohol and Christmas carols. The burn in the back of her throat, the detachment she feels, everything in slow motion. His lips on her skin in a dark bedroom as she fumbles with everything. Her sweater snagging on the corner of his dresser. The faint sound of Little Drummer Boy in the back of her mind as he rolls off of her.

She throws up in his bathroom at four in the morning, trying to be quiet about it. Knowing his comfort would do nothing to calm her. The feel of his hand on her back won't make this any better. If anything, it will make it worse. She tastes the bile, the acidic flavor burning the roof of her mouth. She splashes water onto her face and watches her reflection as the droplets of it run down her nose and drip from her eyelashes. She sadly thinks, Merry Christmas.

She doesn't crawl back into bed with him. She takes her cell phone out into the hallway and, still half drunk, she calls him.

It's almost five now, but he still answers. She starts to cry when she hears his voice. She says, "Are you coming home for Christmas?" Her words slur together in places. She closes her eyes and lets her head fall back against the wall. She tries to imagine being with him, in his apartment. Not here, in Logan's dorm, drunk and sick and making a long distance call to a boy who doesn't love her.

She slides slowly down to the floor at his response, "Yeah. Liz asked me to come up."

She feels exhaustion coming over her suddenly. "Good. That's…good." And with this last word, she is halfway to sleep.

Until his voices comes again and everything inside her rises. "Don't try to see me while I'm there. Just…leave it. Okay?"

"I…" She is going to be sick again. She is gripping at the hem of Logan's oversized t-shirt, pulling at its seams, wanting to rip it apart. "I don't know if I can make that promise."

"Well, try." He hangs up.

She isn't sure if it is still the alcohol or something entirely different that is making her feel as though she is outside of her body, looking down at herself as she breaks down in the hallway, as she bites down hard on the collar of her t-shirt. She allows the darkness to take her as her head meets the floor.

* * *

She wakes up in the hallway, wearing only a t-shirt. She is curled up by the door with her phone laying open next to her. Logan is standing above her with an amused smirk on his face.

"Ace, what are you doing out here in the hall?"

She sits up and closes her phone, smoothing her hair with her hands. "I had to make a phone call and I guess I fell asleep."

He offers his hand to her. "Come on. Take a shower and we'll go get breakfast, okay?"

She stands, balancing herself with a hand flat against the wall. "I can't. I, uh, have to go. Meet my mom."

She rushes into his room, pulling on last night's clothes and searching for her car keys. She remembers that he picked her up last night. "Shit."

He appears behind her, a hand on her hip. "I can drive you home."

She closes her eyes and doesn't turn to face him. "No, no, no, no…" She whispers it over and over to herself.

His hands force her to turn around. "Rory, I can take you home. It's fine."

"No. I'll take a cab. I have money." She pushes him aside and makes her way to the door, pulling her shoes on as she goes.

She doesn't turn around and she doesn't explain. She doesn't think about him on the way home. She doesn't replay the way he had whispered in her ear as he fell asleep, "I love you." She doesn't relive every touch, not like she used to do when it was all new to her.

She is thinking about Philadelphia. She wonders if his apartment building is covered in snow. She wonders if his nose still turns red in the cold, if his eyes still become an impossibly light shade of brown when surrounded by winter. She wonders if there is a girl at work whom he hopes to get caught under mistletoe with. She wonders if he listens to Andy Williams singing Sleigh Ride on the radio and smiles. Or if he quickly changes the station or turns it off altogether. She wonders if he thinks about her at all when a snowflake lands on his lips.

* * *

He nearly falls over coming out of his building that afternoon. The ice on the steps being impossible to see. Annalise stands on the sidewalk and laughs at him as he tries to catch his balance, his arms flailing out. He gives her a look and she tries her hardest to keep a straight face.

He takes her hand when he finally makes his way down the steps and says, "It isn't funny. I could've broken my tailbone! And that hurts."

She smiles. "It's a little funny."

"Fine." He murmurs in defeat, putting his arm around her waist and pulling her close to him.

She is new and she is beautiful. These are the two reasons he gives himself for seeing her. Her blonde hair is blowing around her face in the cold wind, herface flushes a bit, her smile overflows into spring green eyes. He kisses her freckled cheek quickly and she laughs out loud.

She's a poet. That's how he met her. His press is printing a volume of her poetry. Verse upon verse about trees and the sky and how the moon talks to the stars. He never cared for poetry much. Not until he read her poem about fallen clouds and skeleton trees. The words echoed of the past, of Rory, of the harsh contrast between his branches and her whiteness. It had liberated him in some way, to see it written down, to know that someone else had felt it and surpassed it.

She is drunk off of eggnog at a friend's Christmas party, leaning on him and laughing. He watches her as she sways back and forth, pressing against him and then gone and then pressing once more. He finds himself reaching out for her hand to keep her against him. She stays this time and looks at him. She kisses him firmly on the mouth and when she pulls back from him, her eyes dart upward. He follows her gaze and sees mistletoe dangling above them.

He groans, kissing the corner of her mouth again. "You know I hate stupid traditions."

Her hands have slipped beneath his blazer, running along his back. She frowns. "Bah humbug."

Later that night, they are facing each other in bed, the light of the moon falling on their faces. He thinks about kissing her now, making love to her again. Her legs reach out for his, entangling themselves. She moves closer to him.

"What are you trying to run from?" She asks quietly, her eyes not moving from his. When he doesn't say anything, she goes on, "You just seem to be pushing this relationship forward as quickly as possible. You've got to be running from something." And then, "I know I am."

His hand reaches out to push back a piece of hair falling into her eyes. Her skin is warm beneath his fingertips and he leaves them there for a second, trying to remember the last time he had been so tender with someone. The muscles of her face tighten as she smiles.

"His name's David." She says suddenly. Her smile falls, her eyes remain on his. "Who I'm running from. Who all the poems are about." And in a muted whisper that breathes against his shoulder, "My skeleton tree."

His fingers feel moist as her tears fall and he moves them from her face. And because her name is always resting somewhere in the back of his throat, waiting, it falls into the space between him and Annalise easily, "Rory." Her legs tighten around his for a second. "She's…" But, he stops. He doesn't want to open this particular floodgate.

He sees a flash of emerald as her eyes look up to meet his. He wants to take the name back and tell her, "I'm not running from anyone. I just want you." He wants to be able to say this and he wants it to be true. He wants to fall in love with her and not have it be false or incomplete. He knows right now this is impossible.

So instead he says, "She says she's in love with me. But, I can't do it again."

"Why not?"

He reaches out for her, pulls her against him, arms around her waist, her face in his chest. He feels her breath on his skin. "Because loving her kills me." He takes a breath and tries to get closer to her. "And I'm so fucking sick of dying."

Her lips press against his chest and she turns her head to replace her lips with her ear, listening for his heart. "Well, I just want to make someone feel alive for once."

(But even this, this beautiful blonde poet, his ability to feel weightless for her, his unafraid exhibition of this feeling, is because of _her_.)

* * *

There are three messages on her phone from Logan. All of them sound too desperate, too high pitched, not like him at all. She listens to the first.

"Hey, it's me. You've been acting sort of weird lately and the way you left this morning…What's going on with you, Ace? Is this about that guy? The one who wrote the book? Whatever it is, just talk to me. We can work it out. I want to work it out. I love you. Just call me back when you can."

He says it all the time now, that he loves her. She isn't sure that he means it, that he knows what it means to really love someone. She wants to ask him what he thinks love is, why it is that he thinks he loves her. She keeps her mouth shut though, because she is almost certain any answer he gives her will be wrong.

The two messages after the first are deleted at the first intake of air.

Maybe he does love her. And maybe she hates him for it.

* * *

**A/N: Not necessarily my strongest chapter as far as writing goes, but I really like this one. I just really like the idea of Jess with someone else and just wanting to be able to love someone else. And I loved finding that Chuck Palahniuk quote in the midst of writing this because it was so applicable to everyone's situation here. Anyway, let me know what you think. Give me a review for Christmas.**


	4. IV

Logan has the ability to make her feel unbelievably safe. Maybe this is why she stays with him. With him, she feels like nothing will touch her. He won't let it. It's his money, his standing in the world, his unfailingly urbane demeanor. It would hurt his name too much for something to happen to her. She is now an attachment, something that comes along with him. She is expected to be places, make an appearance. She finds a strange comfort in this. 

She is downing another flute of champagne, listening to the clink of glasses and the piano playing somewhere in another room. The laughter roaring through the hall, echoing off of the high ceilings. That fake kind of laughter, too loud, too sudden. She closes her eyes and tries to place herself somewhere else. At home with her mother, watching late night TV. A bucket of ice cream in her lap. Wearing pajamas, not this stifling cocktail dress or these painful heels.

Her eyes snap open again when someone touches her elbow. She turns to face Logan with a warm smile. "Hey." He's been gone for almost two hours. She doesn't mention it. He always disappears and leaves her in some corner until he needs her to meet someone.

"Hey, Ace." He kisses her on the cheek. He begins to steer her in the direction of whoever it is she has to make an impression on. "Have you met the Goldstein's?"

She finds herself placed in front of an older couple. She smiles and shakes her head, turning slightly towards Logan. "No, I don't believe I have, Logan." This is all rehearsed, carefully choreographed. She makes sure she positions her feet the right way and smiles enough to show her top row of teeth but not the bottom. That would be excessive, he told her once. She has learned that body language is key in this world.

For instance, right now she doesn't put her hand out. She waits until Logan has said the first syllable of her last name. At that moment, her hand is there for them to shake. And she smiles and says, "It's so nice to meet you." Then, she makes an excuse to leave. This time it's, "Would you excuse me? I have to go freshen up." Generic and she hates it. But her creativity is shot after three hours of this.

She's about to climb the stairs and find someplace quiet and secluded. She is thinking about calling him, her phone weighing heavy in her small handbag. Before she can do any of this, Logan is grabbing her and kissing her fiercely on the mouth. She forgets about the monotony of these parties, that nagging feeling that she is on display, his knack for disappearing at the most inopportune time and when he tells her that he loves her, she says it back.

* * *

He wakes up at least two times during the night, every night. He assumes it is linked to his childhood. When he was always waiting for his mother to come home or waiting for her boyfriend to leave. And so, he finds himself staring at the ceiling at two in the morning. He finds himself listening to her heavy breathing next to him. She breathes with her mouth, lips parted, soft snores coming every once in a while. The long waves of her hair are strewn across the pillow and he reaches out for a piece of it, fingering the ends. He isn't thinking of her at all though. 

He drops her hair back onto the pillow and turns on his other side. He watches the wall, the clock, the phone. Anything to stop the twisting of his stomach at the thought of where he will be tomorrow. Tomorrow, those hundreds of miles of distance, that buffer space, will be taken from him. He will be within miles of her, two or three. At the most twenty-three or so.

He tries to close his eyes and coax himself to sleep. He tries to breathe evenly, but his heart won't stop beating so rapidly. He turns over again to look at Annalise, to let her presence put him at ease. However, she is only another reminder. Tomorrow, she won't be there. She will be here and that buffer space will be placed between them instead.

A sort of nervous energy fills him and he gets out of bed. Slowly pulling his legs from beneath the sheets, not wanting to wake Annalise. He grabs the phone on his way out of the bedroom. The door closes behind him softly and he finds himself standing at the kitchen sink with a glass of water in his hand. He lets the cool liquid slide down his throat and then dials her number. He shouldn't be calling her. He doesn't want to call her, but he has always worked on instinct and his fingers are telling him this is what he should do. They are telling him this is the only thing that will calm him.

As the phone is ringing, he wonders where she is. He wonders if she's in bed with Logan. Maybe he's interrupting their foreplay. Or maybe she's in the midst of her climax and the ringing of the phone will cause it to end prematurely. Or maybe she's at home, sleeping soundly in her childhood bedroom with a book left open next to her. He likes this last scenario best and tries to imagine her eyes fluttering open at the sound of her phone. He can see her disheveled hair and her weary eyes as she searches for the phone on her cluttered nightstand.

"Hello?" She doesn't sound like she's been asleep. She sounds surprisingly alert.

"Hey." He is trying to sound casual. But there is hardly anything casual about a phone call at two in the morning.

"Jess? It's late. I'm usually the one to call this late at night."

He opens the window in the living room, letting the cold winter air into the apartment. "You should see the city at this time of night." His is whispering, trying not to wake up Annalise.

"Oh yeah?" And at the sound of her smile, he feels calm for a second.

"It never got like this in New York. Quiet, peaceful, still. It only lasts for about half a second and then a car alarm will go off or someone will yell or sirens will sound. But for this half a second, there's nothing. And you can hear your own heart beating and…." He pauses. "I just like to be awake for this."

"It sounds nice."

He wishes he could reach inside the phone and pull out her voice, let it keep him sane for a while. Let it wrap itself around the inner workings of his ear. Let it take up residence in his brain for a while. This is the problem with phone calls; they end and that's it. The feeling goes as the dial tone comes.

"It is."

"But, that's not why you're awake." She says it like a fact.

"It's not?"

"You can't sleep through an entire night. Not since you were what? Eight? You wake up at least once or twice."

He doesn't remember telling her that, but maybe he did, in one of his weaker moments as a teenager. Maybe in one of those moments when he was so overwhelmed by her beauty that he felt her eyes should have his secrets. He had probably told her then.

"So…Tomorrow." She is the one to segue into this discussion and this surprises him.

"Rory…" His fingers start to twitch against the window sill and he wishes he hadn't run out of cigarettes yesterday.

"I won't see you. I will avoid you. I won't go to Luke's. I won't go anywhere in Stars Hollow besides my house and the inn." She pauses, taking a breath. "I think it's probably for the best." But her voice isn't strong enough to convince him.

"Rory…" He wishes he could think of something to say besides her name. He wishes it wasn't the only word that made any sense in his mind, the only one that wasn't just a jumble of letters.

He hears the floorboards creak and turns his head to find Annalise leaning against the doorjamb, watching him. She is halfway across the room, but he can see her eyes clearly, emerald slowly dimming as she turns away from him. And for the first time, he feels guilty. For the first time, this has hurt her.

The silence must have lasted for longer than he thought, because she is saying into the phone, "Jess? Are you still there?"

He falters. "Yeah. Yeah, look, I have to go."

"Oh, okay. Bye."

In the bedroom, she is hurriedly pulling her clothes on. He sits down next to her on the edge of the bed while she pushes her long legs through her jeans. Her hair falls and blocks his view of her face. When he reaches out to correct this, she moves her head away from him.

She stands in front of him with her hands on her hips. He knows something should be said, but that name is still the only word floating around in his head. And that isn't what needs to be said right now. She sighs and shakes her head, walking out of the bedroom.

He stops her at the front door. His hand gripping her elbow, causing her to drop her keys. "We had an understanding."

Her eyes move over his face before she bends over to pick up her keys. "We did. We did have an understanding, but at some point, I crossed the line and I thought you were going to follow me. I guess I thought wrong." She grabs her coat and gives him another look. "We were just supposed to be placeholders for each other. Until the real thing came back to us, until we were ready for that. But…I don't want to be a placeholder anymore. I want to be…It doesn't matter. You won't ever not be in love with her. I'm leaving."

But she doesn't move away right away. She lingers in front of him, close enough for him to touch her face. There is nothing he can tell her. He can't contest anything she's said. It's true. He opens his mouth, hoping words will just come to him. They do, "Anna, don't go. She isn't anything to me anymore. That call? She was just assuring me that she wouldn't try to see me when I was in town. I want…."

Of course he can't finish that sentence, because all of it is a lie. Every word coming out of his lips is untrue. But, right now, he is tired of letting the past, the ghosts of his history, ruin things for him. He won't let one of the few real things in his life slip between his fingers again. Not again.

* * *

He likes the long stretches of road where it all seems endless, like he won't ever reach that point in the distance. He likes the feeling of being so close to something unattainable. And he can find solace in the hypnotic hold the lines of the road have on him. The intermittent dotting of white in his periphery. There, he feels immortal. He feels as though nothing will touch him, nothing can touch him. He is free, speeding along the black pavement. Free until he reaches the end. Until that unattainable point is suddenly all he has in his hands. But, for those few moments when there is nothing in front of him but road and air, he can smile without hesitance or reluctance. 

It takes three hours to get there from Philadelphia. And this is three hours of rare happiness for him. Untainted happiness. He tries to keep his mind from where he will end up at the end of these three hours. But it is there, screaming inside his mind. He will be right back in the middle of everything he has been trying to get away from these past three years. He will be suddenly back where he started. This is a time warp to the beginning of everything.

Only for four days, he tells himself. And then it is back to reality, his real life. Back to Philadelphia and Annalise and books and writing and trying to keep his heart beating every day. It is a life of getting by, of heavy, staggered breathing. It is a life of making the most of what is handed to him. Settling, he thinks. The word causes pressure to build behind his eyes and he shuts them tightly for a second before refocusing on the road in front of him. That endless road, that boundless sense of freedom. He gulps the air like it's never been sweeter. He smiles.

Has still hasn't stopped calling her, despite everything. Part of him needs it, the stability in the fact that she will always pick up the phone. And that she will always love him. She will say it over and over if he asks and sometimes he does. Just to hear the sound of her voice when she hits that crucial V in the midst of the phrase. Just to close his eyes and pretend that this is okay and that it isn't breaking him down.

* * *

At eleven that morning, something shifts in her world. The air becomes strange and heavy. Her balance seems to falter. Her eyes become foggy. And she knows that he's driving into town at that moment. She can feel him as the distance between them gets smaller and smaller. She doesn't know if she can take this feeling for an entire four days. It gets harder to breathe and harder to keep walking. Maybe this is fear or maybe this is something that hasn't been named yet. She isn't sure. 

She is going to break her promise. She is going to see him. She doesn't think she has a choice. And if nothing else, she just wants to stand next to him for a second and listen to his body working to keep him alive. She wonders if he'll allow her that. She guesses he won't.

At one, she finds herself walking towards the diner. Thinking, Mistake, mistake, mistake. Repeatedly in her mind. There is a strong wind pushing her as she walks down the street and she thinks it might be a sign. She ignores it and presses on.

He isn't there though. She walks in and looks around quickly. Not behind the counter, not making his way around the tables, not in any of his usual places. She walks casually up to the counter and sits down.

"Coffee, please." She says automatically when Luke approaches her.

"He isn't here." He says as he pours it for her.

"I noticed." She gulps the hot liquid quickly. And the heat of it flowing through her body starts to make her sweat.

"He's at his mom's."

She nods slowly, waiting for him to say more. Give her more information about his whereabouts. Where he'll be at six this evening. If she could find him beneath a streetlight in the middle of the square. Or if she can find him with his feet dangling over the edge of the bridge, blowing his breath into the dark air.

Luke begins to fidget nervously and she knows there's more. He reaches into his pocket and brings out a piece of paper, a small yellow scrap. "He, uh, told me to give you this if I saw you."

She takes it greedily from his hands. It is folded meticulously over and over with the sharpest of creases. She clutches it in her hand as she drops money on the counter and heads out of the door. She feels like this shouldn't be read in private, but she can't stop herself. She stands in the middle of the sidewalk and opens it, tearing it a bit with her eagerness.

It read, "Seven. Anywhere. I'll find you."

* * *

He does find her, sitting in the gazebo with her arms folded across her chest and her mouth twisting nervously. He stands across the street, watching the white Christmas lights hung on the trees bounce off of her hair, getting lost in its soft curls. And then with his hands shoved deeply in his pockets, he approaches her, crossing the street and climbing the short set of stairs. 

She is look the other way and jumps when he says her name. She quickly pulls herself together. "Jess, hey." She moves over so he can sit next to her on the bench. He sits close and this surprises her. His leg touches hers and she holds her breath for a second before whispering, "Isn't the town beautiful?"

He smiles gently. "Like a snow globe."

She enjoys the sound of his voice, undistorted by miles and miles of telephone lines. When she turns to him, he doesn't move and her knee knocks into his causing something to well up inside her. And all she wants is to absorb the warmth of his body.

"This is weird, Jess."

He looks at her. "I know it is."

"I…Why did you…I thought you didn't want to see me."

He still has his hands in his jacket pockets and he feels the corners of a pack of cigarettes. He takes it out of his pocket and looks at her. "Do you mind if I…?" He gestures to the box and the lighter.

She shakes her head. She finds something comforting and familiar in the smell and the way he holds the cigarette in his mouth and the graceful length of his fingers.

He takes a long initial drag and blows it out along with his words, "I didn't want to see you. But, I have to. There are things you should know. Things we should talk about."

Her heart starts up again, beating rapidly against her ribs. "Oh, okay. Like what?"

She watches the ashes falling onto the ground. He is watching the side of her face, his eyes suddenly filled with concern. Because he knows what this will do to her. He takes another drag, holding it for a second. "I'm seeing someone."

Her face is still except for her mouth slowly forming an O. The word doesn't actually ever leave her mouth. Her face falls and then she says, "Do you, uh…Do you love her?"

"Maybe."

And that O is back again. "Is that why you wanted to see me? To rub it in my face that you love someone new? What do you want me to say? That I'm happy, that you deserve this? You do deserve it. You deserve everything. After all that you've been through, you deserve love, yes. But, I won't be happy. It's supposed to be me and you know it."

She is on the brink of hysterics and he places a hand on her shoulder gently which she quickly jerks away from. "You cannot seriously be mad at me. You always had someone else. Before, it was Dean. Now, it's Logan. What, am I just supposed to be lonely while you always have someone to fall back on? I can't love someone else while still being completely torn apart by you? I guess that's your role, huh?"

He throws his cigarette onto the ground as he stands up. As he walks away, he thinks he hears her say his name. He knows it doesn't matter.

* * *

**A/N: This chapter was long and painful for me. But, it was finally finished (and twice as long as my usual chapters). I still don't feel completely satisfied with it, but I made a goal to have it up before the system goes down tomorrow. And I have reached that goal. Just kidding, I didn't. I went and tried to add this to the story and I was denied. Anyway, tell me what you think. Who knows if Rory and Jess will ever be. Even I'm not sure. We'll just have to see where the characters go. Thanks so much to everyone who's been reading this. You are all fantastic. : )**


	5. V

The seasons are proof enough that it is human nature to want what we can't have. Here in the dead, cold, bitter midst of winter, she wants spring. There in the warmth and the freedom of spring, she will find herself longing for the sun of summer. And so it goes. There is always too much of what you have. And she finds herself surrounded by it all and not wanting any of it. She wants what is ahead of her, what is just out of her reach. She wonders if once she has him, she will want something else. If once this chase is over, she'll tire of him and long for other things. Maybe she likes this longing. Maybe it is why she wakes up in the morning, because there is something she wants out there. Because everyday is another opportunity to reach out for it.

His mother lives on Plum in a house she's never seen before though she's sure she's passed it many times. It stands tall and blue with bright yellow shutters. And in the winter sun, it is so bright that her eyes are forced closed. And she stands on the sidewalk, squinting up at this house, her hands clenched in fists at her sides, her knees locking in place. She stands in front of this house on Christmas morning because she wants to give him a Christmas present. It isn't much, but she wasn't sure what to give him. She wasn't sure what was appropriate to give to someone who you only wanted to give yourself to. So she is giving him a journal, leather bound and thick for his pen to press into and his fingers to work steadily over. For his mind, his heart to be spilled onto.

She has been standing in front of his mother's house for possibly thirty minutes. She isn't sure anymore. But it's cold and her fingers have long since gone numb.

Someone opens the front door and her mind instantly knows to flee. Her feet, however, do not.

He walks out of the front door, pulling on a sweatshirt. His strong arms forcing their way through the fabric. He wraps his arms around himself and she's never seen him look more like a child: Shivering and disheveled with tired eyes on Christmas morning.

He stands on the front porch, looking out at her. His look is one of curiosity, not anger or bitterness. Not like she had expected at all. He moves down the steps, taking each one slowly, pausing in between for a few seconds before his foot falls on the next step. Eventually, he is standing at the bottom of the steps. She is still on the other side of the fence that surrounds the house. She makes no move towards him.

He unfolds his arms and pulls the sleeves of his sweatshirt down further so his hands are covered. He shrugs, looking away from her for a second. "Merry Christmas, Rory."

Her body feels stiff from the cold air and his presence. She tries to unlock her knees, but they remain tight. "I, uh, wanted to give you your Christmas present." She reaches into her bag for the package, pulling it out and noticing a tear in the flimsy wrapping paper.

He walks toward the gate in the fence and unlatches it, joining her on the other side.

"It's probably the most generic gift I've ever given somebody. And you, of all people, probably deserve a non-generic gift, but I didn't know what would be appropriate so I just….Well, I don't want to ruin the generic surprise."

He likes hearing her ramble nervously, like she used to do. It means everything isn't ruined.

He is opening it slowly and when she starts to speak, he looks up at her. He smiles. "Just shut up and let me open my present."

With that, he finishes opening it. The paper falls to the ground and he looks at the journal. His eyes moving over its surface. He opens it and flips through its pages, thick unlined recycled paper.

"I thought the non-conformist in you would enjoy unlined paper. I know you don't like feeling…confined."

He looks up at her, his eyes emanating warmth . "It's great."

She smiles fully. "Really?"

"Yeah." He pays no attention to her hand which is now resting on his forearm.

And then her face is falling to the sidewalk because she didn't just come here to give him a present. "Jess, I…" She looks down at the cracks in the cement. There is one running right between them. She places the toe of her shoe on top of it. "I think this is a little ridiculous. You and me, what we're doing. It's…."

He shoves his hands into the pockets of his sweatshirt. His nose is turning red from the cold, his eyes are turning that light shade of brown. " Rory, we are what we are."

"But, we don't have to be." She can smell him, smoke and fabric softener. She takes a step back so as not to lose her head. "Why are you so against this? I know it went wrong the first time, but now we're both ready."

He shakes his head. "It's not as simple as that, Rory. There are other factors involved."

"What factors?"

"Distance, significant others, our so far tragic history, where we are in life right now." He counts each of these off with his fingers. He hesitates on the fifth one though, his pinky still not yet unfurled. "And." He bites down on the inside of his cheek. "And the timing…"

"What about the timing?"

"It's…bad." The word comes out with a cloud of breath and his eyes follow it as it twists through the air and lands in her hair.

She nods her head. "Right. Bad timing. That didn't stop you before."

"I was different then."

She starts to turn away from him slowly, nodding again. "Yeah, I guess you were." She's halfway down the sidewalk when she turns to him again. "You know, I almost miss the old you. At least then you weren't afraid when it came to what you wanted from me."

* * *

The Christmas tree spins. TJ and his mother have opted for an artificial tree that rotates. He sits in the living room, watching the lights as it spins. The colors meld together in a red, green, gold rainbow. Her hears his mother laughing in the kitchen as she tries to cook dinner for "her guys." He smells something on the burner and cringes slightly. The smoke detector goes off and this is his cue. He's been holding the dishrag for about an hour and a half. It is his job to wave away the smoke when this happens. This is the seventh time. He rolls his eyes as he waves the dishrag until the beeping stops. His mother turns to him from her position at the stove and smiles in gratitude. TJ says something from behind the refrigerator door, but it goes unnoticed by Jess.

He sits back down in the recliner by the living room window and gives his attention back to the spinning tree, the buzzing of it, the colors, the jingling of ornaments. There is one branch that always gets caught on the corner of the window sill. It's longer than any of the others. It causes the spinning to be staggered and the whole tree to shake. Something that could be so easily fixed, but no one ever bothers to cut that branch off.

He called Annalise this morning. Her voice sounded different somehow, but he hadn't questioned it. Now, thinking about it, it had been tinged with something close to guilt. And suddenly he knows how she's been spending the days without him. He isn't angry. In fact, he is the opposite. He finds himself almost overjoyed at the thought of her twisting and contorting in her sheets with David. Maybe part of it is for her, because she's got him. Finally. She's got him for now at least. Most of it is for him though. He has been thinking about the future with her and it has always felt like he's being held underwater. He can breathe now.

* * *

A date has been set. Her mother greets her excitedly with the news after she returns from her encounter with Jess. She is screaming at her and wrapping her arms around her as she walks through the door. The middle of February. The peak of the snow season, Valentine's Day, all of these reasons for the date are being listed incoherently by her mother whose smile is contagious despite everything that day has already brought.

"So where've you been? Luke's been cooking like a madman for the past four hours and I was left with no one to talk to after he exiled me from the kitchen."

They're sitting on the living room couch. Rory toys with the ends of her scarf before looking back up at her mother. "I just went for a walk," she says and smiles.

Lying has become easy. She can't think of a single person she isn't lying to anymore. No, she can think of one person.

* * *

He walks through town and breathes in the pure winter air. It's late, after midnight. He isn't sure of the exact time. But, the air is so still that it has to be late. As usual, he can't sleep. So he takes to the streets of this small town, hoping to clear his head. He is looking to achieve some sort of calm. Something that will settle over him and stop everything that is turning.

He's carrying a bottle of cheap champagne in a brown paper bag. The only liquor he could find in Stars Hollow. And he's walking towards her house. Unconsciously, his feet are leading him in that direction. Making the turns so easily and so blindly. Street names having been burned into his memory. He feels his eyes burn and blames the wind, but he grips the neck of the bottle tighter.

Her house is dark and this shouldn't surprise him. It does though. He is astounded that she is capable of sleep when he became an insomniac that minute he was less than fifty miles from her. When he hasn't entirely fallen asleep since years before. Maybe since that day in Luke's apartment three years ago, with the rain falling hard on the roof and her body on top of his.

He quietly makes his way to her bedroom window, knowing this routine all too well. The tapping of his fingers upon the glass resounds in his head, filling it with memories. He taps again, seeing her sleeping form in her bed. She stirs and she's at the window, opening it slowly and cautiously.

"Jess, what are you doing here? It's after three," she whispers as she climbs out of the window to join him on the porch.

He holds up the paper bag. "I thought maybe you could also use a little drink."

She takes the bag from his hand and pulls out the bottle of champagne. "Ah. Doose's famous four dollar champagne. Helping the teenagers of Stars Hollow get to second base for many years."

"Only second base? Well, darn. My plans for tonight are ruined." He smiles and takes it from her. The bottle has a twist off cap that comes off easily. "Huh. Not as satisfying as popping the cork."

She leans back in through the open window of her bedroom and returns with a sweater in her hands, pulling it tightly around her and leading him to the front steps. He sits down next to her and she takes the bottle from him, putting it to her lips and taking a large gulp.

"Easy, tiger."

She passes the bottle back to him and gives him a look. "What are you doing here? More importantly, what are you doing at my house at three in the morning with a bottle of champagne after we have done nothing but fight since you got here?"

He takes a drink and sighs. "Because you were right."

"Right about what?"

Another drink. "About this being ridiculous. About…everything."

"Jess, I.." She stops, and grabs the bottle from his hands, taking another long drink.

"Stop hogging the booze, Gilmore."

"That's not going to get either of us drunk enough to have this conversation, just so you know." She watches his throat as he swallows the liquid.

"Well, there's no harm in trying."

She stands up. "We've got better stuff inside. Come on." She pulls him up by the arm.

In the kitchen, she is bending over and looking through the cabinet beneath the sink. She stands back up, holding a bottle of pink. "Sorry, looks like all we have is this bottle of grenadine."

He takes it from her and examines it. "Great. I can feel my testosterone levels dropping already.

"Well, it tastes like candy and gets the job done." She opens it and takes a swig. "Drink up."

* * *

Drunk in the moonlight, she has never been this beautiful. With rose tinted skin and her slurred tongue. The bottle of grenadine is empty. The bottle of champagne is almost gone as well and they're in her backyard, lying on the cold grass.

She turns to him, laughing for a minute and turning serious. "You know, I went to Yale because of you."

"Did not."

"Well, not entirely. But, it was a deciding factor." Her fingers are toying with the sleeve of his jacket and smiling. "22.8 miles. It wasn't because I would miss you though. It was because I thought you needed me. Which was selfish and clearly a wrong assumption. You don't need anyone."

He rubs his face with his hand, pressing his eyes closed for a minute. "I'm pretty sure Annalise is cheating on me. Not that I was…Whatever." He downs what's left of the champagne and tosses the bottle off somewhere in the grass. "Tell me something…" A drunken pause as he holds his hands up to the sky, gesturing meaninglessly. "…earth shattering."

She scrunches up her face in a strange way. "I just did, didn't I?"

"Well, tell me something else. Something even more earth shattering."

She begins to move in the darkness of four o'clock. He sees her silhouetted against the moon as she towers over him, swinging a leg over his body until she is straddling him . The ground moves underneath him. Spinning, spinning. Alcohol or the overwhelming feeling of her body against his own, he isn't sure. She leans in closer to his face, her hair dances across his chin, his cheeks. She whispers, her breath hot against his mouth. "I'm going to kiss you."

"Well, that's certainly is earth-" He's cut off as her lips stumble awkwardly, drunkenly into his. She tastes like the grenadine, sweet but with a bite and a burn. She is pressing her entirety against him and he kisses her back, taking her face in his hands.

Somewhere in the back of his head, he is saying: Stop. Somewhere in the back of his head, he is saying: You'll regret this. But he can barely hear this through the incessant hum of his being and the quickening pace of his heart.

* * *

**A/N: I'm not sure how I feel about this chapter. But, it's been a couple weeks since my last update and I had this written so I decided to go with it. I'm not really sure at all what's going to happen with this. We shall see. Anyway. Review away.**


	6. VI

Close to heaven, close to those celestial bodies hanging on the blue velvet backdrop of night. She closes her eyes, feeling his entire being taking her over. The wetness of his mouth, the moist warmth of his breath against bare skin, the gentle roughness of his hands. Too much. She goes blind for a second, sees nothing but blackness splashed with bursts of neon yellow and green. Feeling dizzy, she tries to breathe. Impossible. The friction overpowers her and she lets it happen. Lets go, biting at his lip and saying his name through those clenched teeth.

She relaxes her body, lying on top of him. His breathing is staggered. She feels this in the way his ribcage rises and falls at some sort of dotted rhythm. A dotted eighth note and then a quick sixteenth to follow. Neither says a word until it has settled. Until they have steadied themselves.

He is better than Logan. Better than Dean. She idly wonders if this is because she wants it more with him. Because he knows that she wants it more. Because this isn't supposed to happen.

Now, he is turning her hair into a curtain in front of her face, pulling it forward. It comes in sweaty clumps and he combs his fingers through it gently. Smiling.

He stops his fingers suddenly. Pushing her hair back away from her face. He says, "Tell me it's always going to be me." His voice makes her think of the moon and swaying trees caught in a summer wind.

The request surprises her and she hesitates. But, only for a second. "It's always going to be you." But he must already know this. She is certain she has said it to him over the phone countless times She has her own request, just as selfish, just as sincere, "Tell me I'm everything."

His mouth falls into a frown as he scans her face. They are darting around her features and she bites back the smile that comes with the lazy thought that he is trying to commit her to memory. He puts his hand on her cheek and in that broken gravel voice says, "You're everything."

This is what she's wanted, always.

However, there is something in his voice when he tells her this. Like they're doomed. Like saying it means the end. He is defeated, giving up, conceding to this feeling. She kisses him and tries whispering that she loves him, but he stops her with his mouth.

He's hiding in the physical aspect like he used to. He's hiding behind his touches and his kisses, as if they are enough.

* * *

She wakes up enveloped in the warm orange of early morning. For a moment, they are the only two people who exist. The world is just skin and sheets. The world is just his parted lips and her fingers in his hair.

She kisses his face: the crown of his head, his cheekbones, his chin, his mouth. Slowly, delicately. His eyes flutter open and she freezes, watching him cautiously until he leans in to press his forehead against hers. He breathes out a thick, heavy sigh with his eyes closed. And he says, "Morning."

She wants this forever.

"It's early."

"And yet, you're the one awake." His eyes are half closed as he puts his head in her shoulder, a mouthful of her hair.

She laughs at the feeling of his lips against her collar bone, the tickling of his breath. She stops when he lifts his head back up, his eyes filled with something besides morning after playfulness. They are filled with a steady concentration and she can see the possible outcomes rotating in his mind. Each one seeming painful to him. The entire relationship being branded with the word "fatal." He is imagining all of the ways this will end. All of the ways he will be hurt again and all of the ways he will hurt her. She presses her palm flat against his bare chest, spreading her fingers out and feeling his heart.

He takes the hand in his, looking down at the pair. "Rory…"

"No. Stop. Don't…just, don't." She's upset already. She's been awake for five minutes and she's already crying and regretting the entire night. "Don't say what you're going to say. That this was a mistake. That you can't be with me. Because I know, okay? I already know. So-"

He's pushing the hair behind her ear and she finds herself unable to speak with his fingertips brushing against her skin that way. He is still looking at her with that steady gaze and he says, "I wasn't going to say any of that." He's smiling so widely that she has to look away because she thinks this is his private smile that people aren't suppose to see ever. So she's looking down toward their fingers still locked together when he says, "I was going to say…That I lied."

Her head springs up. "When?"

And the smile turns into his smirk and she feels overwhelmingly comfortable. "You know when."

She kisses him, letting all of herself leak into the action, surrendering her being to showing him love with her mouth. Because she doesn't want to hear him say it out loud. That he's loved her for all of these years, that it never stopped, that he's been trying to deny it but he can't. And it isn't him to say these things out loud and all she wants right now is him.

* * *

He tries to count the hairs on her head. One by one, his fingers separate the strands and count each one off. But not without first examining its color and letting his fingertips slide against it for a few seconds. He is almost to ninety-three when she opens her eyes. She smiles that deadly half asleep, post coital smile at him and laughter swells up in his stomach. Lovesick laughter that makes him almost want to cry because this won't happen again. He won't be this happy again, or at least not happy in this exact way again. This feeling is something that is impossible to duplicate. And all he can do is smile against the soft skin of her cheek.

In his head, he's making promises about forever to her. He's saying, "Always, always, always." He's tracing his fingers along her skin, memorizing her in her youth, imagining wrinkles on this currently taut exterior. He's so content that he wants to die.

Soon the early morning hours will give way to reality and they will have to face it. The orange will turn to bright midday yellow and she'll go back to being attached to the blonde haired rich boy. He'll go back to being attached to miles and miles of space between him and her. Somehow he knows nothing will change.

* * *

"You knew this would happen!" He's yelling into a cell phone on the side of the interstate. He's pacing behind his car, the cold rain hitting his face. His fingers are numb and he's angry. "Don't make me feel guilty when you were doing the same thing while I was gone."

Annalise is crying hard. He hates her for that, for those heaving sobs she gives into the receiver. They almost convince him.

"Oh, come on. Don't pretend that you weren't fucking David's brains out this past week!" Almost.

She doesn't say anything. The entire conversation is just him screaming at her over the sound of rain and speeding cars. He doesn't mind. It's better this way. Easier.

She starts a phrase that sounds like it could be, "I'm sorry." But he hangs up and gets back into his car, easing himself back into traffic and forgetting. About her face when she cries (he's seen it so often). About her blonde hair and her fingers and the way she curled against him in the middle of the night. About the false sense of comfort she had provided, the love that wasn't real at all. About the past few months entirely.

* * *

She wants him badly right now. She can feel it in her fingertips, a tingling, an aching to touch him. To feel his skin, the soft hair on his forearms. It isn't that she misses him (though this is true after a mere two days since his departure). It is this insatiable lust that keeps turning inside of her. The persistent thirst for his mouth and his limbs. She aches throughout her entire body.

But she's sitting across from Logan at an ornate and expensive restaurant. Tonight is the night that it comes out. He kissed her when he picked her up and she felt sick to her stomach. And now he is looking at her with that smile in his eyes and she has to look away, turning her head back down to the menu. She is going to break up with him tonight, right now. If she could only find her voice and some courage.

As it stands, she is acting as though nothing is different. As though she hadn't slept with another man just two nights ago. As if it wasn't the only thing she could think about, dream about. She's a coward.

His fork is halfway to his mouth when he stops. He notices. She is sure it is written all over her face. She must be blushing furiously at the thoughts that are passing through her head: thoughts of her and Jess so beautifully tangled together. He stops and puts his fork down and says, "Okay, Ace. What's wrong? You haven't touched your food."

She runs her fingers nervously along the stainless steel of her fork and doesn't look up at him when she says faintly, "This is what's wrong."

He's reaching across the table to take her hand, but she pulls it back and lets it fall in her lap. "I-I'm not…I don't love you, Logan. I never did. I can't…" She looks up at him then because he needs to hear this, really hear this, "You aren't what I want."

He leans back in his chair and then leans forward again, bringing his face closer to hers than it was before. "Ace-"

"I really wish you wouldn't call me that."

And with that, he stands up, almost knocking his chair over as he does. He raises his hands as he backs away. "Alright, Rory." He says her name deliberately, drawing out each of the two syllables. "Fine. You win."

Her eyes follow him intently as he walks out of the restaurant, not leaving him until he's gone. Only then, when he's vanished, does she let them fall closed as relief washes over her.

This relief doesn't last long. Just as she pulls up in front of her house, his car is behind hers. The silver Porsche gliding into their driveway. She doesn't get out of the car. She watches him in her rearview mirror until he's knocking on the driver's side window. She rolls it down quickly. "What do you want, Logan?"

He leans down to be at her eye level and shifts on his feet a little. "Can we do this with you out of the car so I don't have to lean over awkwardly to talk to you?"

She folds her arms across her chest, her seatbelt still buckled. "No. We can do this just like this." And then with an angry sigh, she throws her hands up in the air. "Didn't I just break up with you? God, Logan."

He rests his hand on the car, leaning his weight against it as he looks down at her. "Rory, you're making a huge mistake. What we have? It's good. It could be potentially great. Don't be rash here, Ace."

"I'm not being rash. I'm being honest." She clenches her teeth tightly. "I don't want to be with you anymore."

He pushes himself off from the car and begins to pace in front of her. Suddenly, he stops and turns to her, a look of determination in his eyes. "Marry me."

"What? Are you-"

"Do it. Marry me. I love you. Come on."

She unbuckles her seatbelt and gets out of the car, pushing past him and making her way to the door. He grabs her arm fiercely and turns her around. "Ace-"

She rips herself from him and climbs the front stairs. At the top, she turns around. "No." And she lets the front door crash as it closes behind her.

* * *

Back in Philadelphia, his hands won't stop shaking and he can't stop pacing. Back and forth in front of the window, in front of the stove, the refrigerator, his bed. Just pacing. Because he's anxious.

Until the phone rings. He jumps at the sound, lunges for the receiver, answers entirely too eagerly. An abrupt, "Hello?" And a smile, a wave of relief, at the returning sound of her voice.

But, "He asked me to marry him." Here is where his stomach drops and he feels his entire chest constrict in some awful way. This is a panic attack, he realizes. This is utter fear, blinding fear. And it's all happening in the span of mere seconds. Then she adds, "After I break up with him, he has the nerve to show up and ask me to marry him."

But he's still uncertain. "You did say no, right?"

"Of course," she answers harshly, offended that he would even think she would accept the proposal.

"Okay." He breathes, raking his hand through his hair. "Good."

There is a pause, a long silence passes between the two of them. He looks out the window at the cars passing below, at the people on sidewalks. Music from another apartment seeps through the walls, the thudding of the bass pulsates through the floor. He hears laughter from somewhere down the hall and presses his hand against the cold glass of the window. He thinks about leaving. About going back to Connecticut. About being with her always, always, always.

But he can't. For so many reasons that he isn't sure he can name anymore, he can't leave.

She shatters the silence with a weak voice that whispers, "I miss you."

"Yeah." He walks away from the window and lets himself fall onto the couch. Thrown across the arm is a sweatshirt that belongs to Annalise. He picks it up, looking at it for a second before tossing it across the room and into the box with the rest of her things. "Same here."

* * *

**A/N: Yeah, sorry this chapter took almost a month to get done. It isn't even that good. I'm not sure how I feel about the whole Logan proposing bit, but I felt like this chapter needed a little bit of drama at least. I don't now what's going to happen with this now. But, anyway, leave me a review and let me know what you're thinking. Hopefully, I'll get some brilliant idea for the next chapter and have it up quicker than I had this one up. **


End file.
